Word: klan
(lookup in dictionary)
(lookup stats)
Dates: during 1990-1999
Sort By: most recent first
(reverse)
...simple, yet stirring: rednecks rape a black girl; the girl's father, Carl Lee (Samuel L. Jackson), retaliates with murder; he goes on trial in a racially volatile atmosphere. Enter his idealistic young lawyer, Jake (Matthew McConaughey); his mentor, Lucien (Donald Sutherland); the ruthless prosecutor (Kevin Spacey); and a Klan member or two (e.g. Kiefer Sutherland)--the story's ready-made. Sandra Bullock weaves her way through the story as Jake's indispensable assistant...
...From the very beginning, following the careening path of the redneck's pick-up truck, we feel it's rolled right off the pages on to the screen. Readers of the book might become bored because of its own decidedly cinematic feel: Ruby-style shooting of suspects, Ku Klux Klan marches against Carl Lee's supporters and the like...
...film's flourishes include everything you've seen in the trailers: the ominous reflection of Klan members in a shop window; Spacey's prosecutor Buckley brandishing a bulky gun to make a point; or Samuel L. Jackson's face at any of his many stages of pop-eyed rage. Other touches involve the bathing of a Klan member tete-a-tete in ethereal light or Jake's haggard face in the lined shade of half-open blinds...
...likable--maybe even lovable--movie. These are admittedly strange words to apply to a bristling melodrama that begins with the brutal rape of a young black girl and proceeds to the murder of her redneck assailants by her father, then to his trial, during which a revived Ku Klux Klan employs the full range of its all-too-familiar terrorist tactics as it tries to prevent justice from being done...
...Grisham's first novel, is over, crosses will burn on the lawn and crucial witnesses will falter on the stand. Worse, Brigance's home will be destroyed by arson, his marriage will be nearly wrecked, and his tempting, perky paralegal (Sandra Bullock) will be abducted and abused by the Klan. But he will persevere. And his closing argument--screenwriter Akiva Goldsman's most visible addition to the book--will tear your heart...